Share This Episode
Amy Lawrence Show Amy Lawrence Logo

Sean Grande | Celtics Radio PxP Voice

Amy Lawrence Show / Amy Lawrence
The Truth Network Radio
June 7, 2024 5:45 am

Sean Grande | Celtics Radio PxP Voice

Amy Lawrence Show / Amy Lawrence

On-Demand Podcasts NEW!

This broadcaster has 2086 podcast archives available on-demand.

Broadcaster's Links

Keep up-to-date with this broadcaster on social media and their website.


June 7, 2024 5:45 am

Boston Celtics radio PxP broadcaster Sean Grande joins the show to recap a Game 1 Finals win! Plus how did the crowd welcome Kyrie Irving?

YOU MIGHT ALSO LIKE
Amy Lawrence Show
Amy Lawrence
Amy Lawrence Show
Amy Lawrence
Amy Lawrence Show
Amy Lawrence

This episode is brought to you by Progressive Insurance.

Whether you love true crime or comedy, celebrity interviews or news, you call the shots on what's in your podcast queue. And guess what? Now you can call them on your auto insurance too with the name your price tool from Progressive.

It works just the way it sounds. You tell Progressive how much you want to pay for car insurance and they'll show you coverage options that fit your budget. Get your quote today at Progressive.com to join the over 28 million drivers who trust Progressive. Progressive Casualty Insurance Company and Affiliates.

Price and coverage match limited by state law. Here's why April chose to vaccinate her child. I think actually meeting someone who was not vaccinated and now has a lifelong struggle with a childhood disease really cemented for me that it's super important that we as parents continue to vaccinate our children.

Talk to your pediatrician or visit YVaccines.com. Brought to you by Merck. Worried about letting someone else pick out the perfect avocado for your perfect impress them on the third date guacamole? Well, good thing Instacart shoppers are as picky as you are. They find ripe avocados like it's their guac on the line. They are milk expiration date detectives. They bag eggs like the 12 precious pieces of cargo they are. So let Instacart shoppers overthink your groceries so that you can overthink what you'll wear on that third date. Download the Instacart app to get free delivery on your first three orders while supplies last.

Minimum $10 per order additional term supply. Sean Grandy is back on the show. Long time Celtics play by play voice. We're always glad to have him.

He's one of my favorites in the entire business for many reasons. So let's jump in at that point. Kristaps Porzingis comes off the bench. He gives them a jolt of energy and sparks a run. They outscore the Mavericks by 30 over this stretch from for mid first quarter to about halftime. What changed over that time?

Well a lot of things changed. The shot started falling. You know the open threes they had generated some and even in the early part of the game if you watch it over again you'll see the Celtics generated great shots in the first couple of minutes and they got offensive rebounds. They just weren't knocking them down but it was very much like as I sat there and talking to Jaylen Brown after the game and Max and I talking about is that what's going on is they'll less like game one of the NBA finals in this brand new stratosphere as it did the same night we've seen so many times this year in this outrageously historically dominant season that the Celtics have had there been a lot of nights that were just you know knockouts and that's what happens when the threes fall for the Celtics it's impossible to beat them you can beat Boston but they have to have not just an average offensive night Boston has to have an atrocious offensive night for the most part for you to beat them and they certainly didn't in game one.

Any signs at all of the layoff or the the few days extra that they had over and above Dallas but being off for more than a week? I don't think so because they've gotten used to it like this is the fourth where everyone has said that a talking point has been this is the fourth straight series that Dallas has opened on the road well this is also the fourth straight series of the Celtics have had a week to get ready for it and knew their opponent in three of the four cases the exception being Cleveland because they went to game seven in the first round but the Celtics had known they were going to play and they've had a week or a little more this happened four times in a row because remember the play-in tournament the Celtics had a week off before they played in the first round and the first round was really stretched out so the amazing thing is that Porzingis missed 40 days he only missed 10 games. I know I said that on the air this week well I'm glad you bring up Kristaps Porzingis certainly an incredible jolt of energy when he came off the bench why wasn't he in the starting lineup? That's an interesting thing that Joe Missoula probably addressed after the game and I think it was a matter of total minutes that you wanted to play him you also had sort of the element of surprise too like how many times in the NBA could you have any kind of lineup element of surprise right and the Celtics actually listed Porzingis in the starting lineup at first and then they had it you know you have to submit by a certain time there's a change and that was a late change from the lineup that was issued to us that had Porzingis starting but in the end if you want to play him for you know 27 minutes in you know Joe Missoula told everybody before the game that he wasn't on a quote-unquote minute restriction so I don't know if this would be the first time a coach ever lied to the media in the history of sports which happens all the time at every other not your job as a coach just tell the truth clearly was a minute restriction by you look at the segments that he played so obviously the decision was made that was who you who do you want him to play with who do you want him to match up with you know maybe it was going to be better against Lively than it was against Gafford it's really the Celtics it's more who's on the floor together and how he's spacing the floor who starts and who finishes doesn't really matter to that bunch. 20 points in 21 minutes off the bench with the six rebounds and the three pretty impressive blocked shots for Kristaps Porzingis. Sean Grandy fresh off game one of the NBA finals for the Celtics radio network we're always excited to have him here on after hours with Amy Lawrence what was it like in the garden as he comes off the bench he provides not just the offense but the defense and it seemed to spark that run. It went all the way back to when he came out for warm-ups and then he went back to get retaped before the game and they put on the jumbotron this sort of WWE shot where you just see Porzingis walking from the locker room all by himself and probably just all engaged in this and then he comes out to the tunnel and an NBA finals game in Boston doesn't need any extra juice but that certainly provided it and then for him to play so well from the start you're expecting him to come back after 40 days and he's going to be out of rhythm and he's going to miss passes and he's going to miss shots and instead he looked like you know the same dude he's been all year. So then thinking about the third quarter Luka Doncic he does what he does but how did they get it all the way down to eight? The same defense they've been the top they were the top defensive team in the league the last six weeks of the regular season it's funny because there's some similarities between what Dallas did and what the Celtics did two years ago whereas the Celtics were under 500 they were actually in 11th in the East midway through the in the East midway through the year two years ago and obviously became the dominant defensive team and stormed all the way to the finals only to lose to a team that had been there before and now Dallas wasn't quite as early in the year three quarters of the way through the year they're in the eighth spot in the West and then they make the change defensively and they put Jones in the starting lineup they're the number one defensive team make the run through the playoffs and now they're in the finals playing a team on the road that has been in the finals you know in within the last couple of years so there's some similarities there well you know Luca hit tough shots this is going to happen throughout the series it is a mortal lock that Luca is going to hit two or three soul snatching gut-wrenching shots in every game it's just that there are a hundred possessions against a team that people for whatever reason have refused to accept how historically dominant they've been and for all the people I think a lot of people have been talking themselves into Dallas and are they capable of winning the series sure they are but teams no team as dominant as the Celtics were this year has never not won the championship so that tonight essentially there's six elite players that Boston is playing that Joe Missoula has and his and Dallas has two of them and one of them was not good tonight so Jason Tatum didn't have a great shooting night he had six turnovers in the game there were some things the Celtics didn't do well including the stretch of the game that you're talking about and yet this is a blowout in game one so is Dallas can they be better and will they be better in game two absolutely but I'm not sure that was even the Celtics best punch you mentioned the defense and Jalen Brown he says even our white guides guard after the game so what stands out about the defense that the Celtics were able to use on Luca well they have multiple guys everyone says well you can't stop Luca you there isn't a guy that can guard Luca you're right but the Celtics have four guys they can throw I mean all you can do with an elite generational player like that is throw him different looks and make him work and I mean on both ends of the floor and that's the significant part what happened tonight and maybe this will change as the series goes on Dallas is in the NBA Finals because they have two elite offensive players who at their highest level are impossible to stop when they are rolling but they have played teams so far in the playoffs where they've been able to hide one or both of those guys defensively for long stretches of the game the Celtics for the most part are going to have five guys on the floor that can score and so it's one thing for Luca or Kyrie when you have both of them out there that's two guys that you can go at and Luca is going to give you an effort defensively and he's vastly improved defensive player but he still has to work and if you're making Luca work on the defensive end of the floor which he has to against a team like Boston it's going to be really difficult for him to carry Dallas offensively the way he has to the way they asked him to do tonight and then not get any help Sean Grandy is with us from Boston after the Celtics win game one of the NBA Finals though as people have pointed out including Jason Tatum they also did that two years ago against the Warriors it's after hours with Amy Lawrence I will admit to being very petty about this one particular element of the finals I couldn't wait to see how Kyrie was greeted there at the Garden so how would you describe the reception of the former Celtic with his favorite fan base predictable and yet I have a dream I have a crazy pipe dream that obviously is not going to happen because it's not the way the world works but I was kind of hoping that this finals ends up being the point in life where you make friends with your ex and you put everything in the past Kyrie is in a much better place which is really cool to see and I think for Celtic fans how can you keep beating up a guy that you've now beaten 11 straight times that's number one number two at some point after a bad breakup you realize you're in a much better place in your life I think there's just less concern as there should be about Kyrie if you're coupling up with Larry O'Brien it was a bad time it was a difficult two years it was a bad breakup and I always thought the Kyrie years here I had not so much defended him but I thought there was a lot of misunderstanding and plenty of blame to go around for the two years he was here the only time I've really been critical of him was his attitude towards Boston when he was in Brooklyn yes and the stepping on the floor and the playing of the race car so he would just things to try to get the crowd off balance and then he you know reacted badly back to the crowd this is a different dude now and this is a guy it's it's he's so complicated as you tell Kyrie is not a short radio interview he's a podcast it's very complicated there's layers to it and the guy that you see now almost every night in Dallas we saw a lot of that during two years in Boston but you also saw the other Kyrie and it's funny I think he says a lot of the same things now that he said then but he has the life and basketball cachet in that locker room to say it now whereas then he didn't as a young team the young guys didn't really react that well to him and I always thought his two years in Boston just reminded me the old saying about a leader without followers it's just a guy out taking a walk and that's really what I thought those times were Kyrie was you know too young and other things going on in his life and it's a perfect example of how we project so much onto these guys at 23, 24, 25 years old which is remarkable the young men that Jason Tatum and Jaylen Brown are that you you know it's the opposite I think Kyrie and behavioral stuff and under this massive ridiculous spotlight surprised we don't see more of it you know because it's really really difficult to grow up and you know with the world watching. If you look back to two years ago where have you seen the most growth with the athletes that are on the roster now and the team as a whole? Well you talk about now it's an expression you fall back on I hate it at some level but it really applies to this team about adults in the room and that includes two really young players in Jaylen Brown and Jason Tatum and I think there was an element of everything they did from 2017, 18 even maybe get into that finals was ahead of schedule they probably shouldn't have been there it didn't play well under that spotlight if you look historically at teams that meet in the finals when one has had experience and the other hasn't this applies to the Super Bowl I don't know if it applies as much to the World Series but there is something different about this stage there were a lot of guys on the Mavericks playing in their first NBA final I thought Jason did a good job getting the young guys out there early to get their feet wet and get a feel for what the NBA finals is like you know it's a different environment but the cliche about valuing every possession the Celtics didn't against Golden State and they the Warriors with all that experience just kept taking advantage of all the mistakes and all the giving away of possessions when you know that every single one counts and I thought you saw tonight Joe Mozilla called a time almost a like a violent race on the court timeout when the Celtics were up by 25 or 22 in the second quarter because he knew the value of every possession he saw that little bit of slippage and there just can't be any mistakes the reason this team won 64 games again people say well they don't have a top five player because it's whatever you want to say about Tatum there's no Jokic there's no Giannis and there's no Luca but they've been unbelievably consistent in valuing every game and valuing possessions and turnovers crazy low and playing hard every night not being affected by a loss or by a 50-point win and that methodical step-by-step nature hasn't been as sexy as the last couple of years when they faced elimination eight times last two years I mean they played they obviously lost two elimination games because they lost they faced elimination 10 times they went eight and two it's incredible but this year isn't what everyone fantasized about because you think about Tatum coming back from three to having that game in Milwaukee and winning game seven at Miami there's been no drama the only crime this team has committed is the biggest one you can in 2024 they've been boring you know because they have been beating people they've been beating people up and here they are 13 and two tonight was the eighth consecutive playoff win for the Celtics the Boston Celtics have never done that before wow and they've had some decent players and some decent teams you think over the years and they've never won eight consecutive playoff games we felt tonight I'm a sucker for a good human interest story and Al Horford just turned 38 years old this week I know he's all business I love how professional he is and the spirit and the heart he brings to the team not to mention the leadership how much has he mentioned what this would mean to him if at all he doesn't talk about what it means to him he shows you by how he plays by how he played in game five in the closed out game against the Cavaliers when he knew it was important that they not give that game away things that have happened in previous years where they've lost all these home games and series have been extended he knew it was important and his best game of the playoffs came in that game when other guys didn't have it he knew they needed to close out and he took it upon himself I think it's one of the fascinating things to take 30,000 foot view of the series because Al is one of two guys True Holiday is the other if the Celtics win three more games here I think you got to start thinking about Hall of Fame here Al Horford and True Holiday and keep this in mind when we talk about Al Horford if it doesn't hit you right away that he's a Hall of Fame player if he wins this championship here you're looking at an unbelievable body of work in the NBA don't forget it's not the NBA Hall of Fame it's the Basketball Hall of Fame and he won back-to-back national championships you know in Florida with Billy Donovan so this is uh and not to mention the other element here if the Celtics win you might be talking about 42 in the rafters given where the bar is for Celtics retiring numbers that's the beauty of the finals and I began my broadcast tonight by talking about how we've had 10 years of Stefan Lebron and we had the Showtime Lakers and the new Big Three Celtics and the old Big Three Celtics and the Pistons and MJ 1-6 titles in between but the guard must change and that's the beauty of it there's going to be a new face and a new team you know at the at the top of the mountain and there's going to be a new young superstar whether it's Luca or you know Tatum and Brown they're going to be at the top of that mountain now and not like Al at age 38 this is a new you know this is a new time we spent the entire year watching talk shows about the Warriors and Lakers and Lakers and Warriors for six months when we all knew there were eight teams and we're never going to be anything but eight the guard has changed we just saw the Minnesota Timberwolves you know have get us close to the NBA Finals as they had been except for 2004 and we saw Oklahoma City as one of the best teams in the NBA all year the guard changes you can't look up and go huh it seems like it's already gone it's changed there are new teams at the top of the ladder that's why whoever takes over the Lakers is you know it's a tough time to be walking into the Western Conference with all those young lines some really good young talent as you point out I mean Anthony Edwards 22 Shea Gildas Alexander so early in his career too uh it's pretty sweet and actually Luca he's been playing pro basketball for 12 years and he's still only what 25 26 Luca I've been documenting this stuff with Tatum for the like you know Tatum is the that has the most point you know as a 25 year old and 26 year old before age 26 most threes ever six on the all-time score Luca is going to blow by Tatum next year because Luca's a year younger than Tatum one question before I let you go where are they vulnerable where they've been vulnerable they have been at time late in the year they got vulnerable on the defensive glass that's not been an area of strength you know for Dallas I think the one where they what they took away here it's more I'm looking at it what does Dallas have to do and it's very difficult to take away the paint and the rim runs with Lively and Gafford and the corner threes but the Celtics took away all of it tonight Dallas is going to make more shots how many open shots did Kyrie miss tonight and that's gonna you know that's going to turn around I think the Celtics can be better offensively they can take better care of the ball um clearly than they did here in game one but what make what's hard to make the Celtics vulnerable is as their depth those top six that you can have four or five of them on the floor at any one time and why there haven't been vulnerabilities you know what vulnerabilities they won 64 games they have the fifth best scoring differential one of the best net rate this is one of the best teams of all time and here's the thing it's gone largely unappreciated as it happened because people were so afraid of the Celtics losing that all they've been saying is well yeah but what if they lose what if they don't win the championship what if they lose again okay if they lose they'll be one of the best teams in NBA history to not win the championship but guess what if they win three more games then they're one of the best teams ever not Celtics history NBA history this is one of the best teams ever rewriting that history as they go and Sean Grandy into what is this year 23 of you behind the microphone uh recently going viral for the final call of the eastern conference finals well you know what's funny about that is I've got I should have known because my son's 12 and he his whole life is YouTube and short videos and whatever and that's the whole thing that you realize like for me that game last week it was just Monday right like I've been doing that for as long as 26 years I've been in the league tv or radio but somebody puts camera on you and at the end of the game and suddenly that's what people content the content driven world we live in now so all of a sudden yeah like I borrowed the best part was max because max people like oh my god max is getting up in the middle of it and leaving because he had to go do the ceremony right hey I'll get here and I'll give you a little insight that no this hasn't really gotten out too much so you remember max gave out the MVP award and when he was about to do it he there was a pause an awkward pause and he said something like how about those you know how about those damn Celtics he was filling time because he didn't have his glasses on he couldn't read the sheet that Lisa Salters was showing him and he almost said now think about this if you write down the names if letters are blurry anyone at a certain age we can appreciate that if letters are blurry and you write down jaylen brown or jason tatum those are going to look pretty similar he almost said tatum and we almost had la la land you know and then you know conference finals so yes oh still in your 23 so you can find Sean on twitter at sean grandy pvp voice of the celtics one of our favorites thank you sean good to talk to you you too this episode is brought to you by progressive insurance whether you love true crime or comedy celebrity interviews or news you call the shots on what's in your podcast queue and guess what now you can call them on your auto insurance too with the name your price tool from progressive it works just the way it sounds you tell progressive how much you want to pay for car insurance and they'll show you coverage options that fit your budget get your quote today at progressive.com to join the over 28 million drivers who trust progressive progressive casualty insurance company and affiliates price and coverage match limited by state law listen as selenia tells us why she chose to vaccinate her daughter i definitely felt like the pros far outweighed the cons the diseases that i am protecting my child against they're still here and at the end of the day it's my job as a mother to keep my child safe talk to your child's doctor and learn more at yvaccines.com brought to you by merc call from mom answer it call silence instacart knows nothing gets between you and the game that's why they make ordering from your couch easier stock up today and get all your groceries for the week deliver it in as fast as 30 minutes without missing a minute of the game you have 47 new voicemails download the app to get free delivery on your first three orders while supplies last minimum ten dollars per order additional term supply
Whisper: medium.en / 2024-06-07 06:44:01 / 2024-06-07 06:53:44 / 10

Get The Truth Mobile App and Listen to your Favorite Station Anytime